Children and family needs are constantly changing and at different times in their lives they will have differing levels of involvement from a range of services, from universal, early help and specialist support services.

Our commitment to Early Help is central to our Children and Young People’s Plan with ‘Early help for all who need it’ cutting across our four priority areas:

• Improved educational attainment
• Protecting vulnerable children
• Early help and improving life chances
• Being healthy and positive

Early Help means providing support as soon as a problem emerges, at any point in a child’s life, from the foundation years through to teenage years.

To ensure that the best possible support is provided to children and families there needs to be an early assessment of need considering child’s developmental needs, family and environmental factors and parenting capacity.